Bikes, bikes, bikes. Bicycles. New ones. Old ones. Parts. Tire pressure. Functional Threshold Power. Head tube angle. Chainstay length. Hydration. Safety. Advocacy and infrastructure.
During the holidays, I end up at a variety of gatherings, and when people talk to me, they bring up bikes, because it’s what I do. I often get introduced as a bike guy, and people have questions or opinions they want to express. I try to nod and smile and let it all play out.
It’s not that I don’t like to talk about bikes. It’s just that I do it an awful lot, and there are other things that might be worth discussing. This is part of the reason I started Hokem magazine with my friend Bob.
It’s Boxing Day today, and I’m going to spend as much of it as I can watching Premier League Football. I was gifted a love of football (the real football) from my Welsh father, and it’s been a constant in my life for more than 40 years. I played weekly (until recently), and I’ve washed the English topflight since the early ’90s when it first started to creep onto American TV screens.
I love music. My preferences are for loud, distorted, angular sounds, but I really like it all. I spend a lot of time looking for new artists. I go to a lot of live shows. We talk about music constantly on the Revolting podcast.
I’m a big reader too. I’m currently embroiled in a Japanese crime novel, but I try to keep up with the Booker prize novels and other literary fiction. I read about physics and biology, a bit of philosophy. I’m not nearly as clever as my reading list might suggest, but I’m trying. I’m trying.
The thing is, none of us is one-dimensional, even when we crowd around this one thing and discuss it ad nauseum. Oh, I’m an avid bird noticer too. And I cook a lot.
This week’s TCI Friday wonders: What else are you into?
Happy Christmas Robot and all TCI readers. Well Robot, bikes are your work, but for those of us who work but not in bikes, work takes up a lot of mindshare. But recreationally, I’m into rock climbing, hiking, mountaineering, church, kids, mentoring young business leaders and still chase my wife around. I have to say every decade seems to get better so far! (55 now.)
I like to look at planets. Mostly Saturn and Jupiter as they are the most interesting.
Trees, punk rock, clean energy, food.